Last week a Tibetan mastiff was flown into Xian airport in central China, where it received a welcome fit for an emperor.

The dog was swept into town by a convoy of 30 Mercedes-Benz cars. Tibetan mastiffs are a rare and noble breed – and the pampered pooch had cost his new owners Rmb4m ($586,000, €402,000, £351,000). Reporting the story, the China Daily newspaper commented nervously that such an extravagant display of wealth might “heighten tension between rich and poor”.

This shaggy dog story is just a particularly weird example of the new wealth of modern China. When I last visited the Pudong district of Shanghai, in the mid-1990s, it was a ramshackle area of factories and warehouses. Last week, I found it transformed into a forest of neon-lit, modernist skyscrapers. China has shrugged off the global recession and should grow by 8 per cent in 2009.

Read more >

Friday morning, British author Martin Jacques talked about his new book, “When China Rules the World: The End of the Western World and the Birth of a New Global Order.” As one listener noted, it’s a great title for getting attention for the book. However, the book itself is less hyperbolic than the title and offers food for thought about how little Jacques thinks China is likely to change as it grows into the world’s dominant economy.

Read more >

我相信中国将对自己的历史和文化更有信心，在全球化的进程中，不会盲从西方，并将起到“抗西化”的作用。

———马丁·雅克

很多人怀疑，我持如此乐观的态度，是否因为我本人对中国特别偏爱。事实上，我对中国的感情很复杂。1998年，为了写这本书，我和妻子哈莉定居香港，两年后，哈莉因病去世，当时我们的儿子只有16个月。在我看来，很大程度上是医院歧视深肤色族裔造成的悲剧。

我的生活完全垮了，此后的五年几乎不能将书继续写下去。我喜欢中国，但中国始终与我心中最悲痛的事联系在一起，你可以想象我写书的时候，与我的写作对象保持着清醒而负责的距离。

Read more >